Turn-About Ranch Gives Kids a Second Chance in the Great Outdoors

By Jane St. Clair

Living in the country enjoying fresh air and nature can have a healing effect on those who suffer from a variety of disorders. Turn-About Ranch, a working youth ranch in Utah, has been successfully using that technique to help troubled teenagers for years.

Many of the teens who come to the residential treatment center, located in Utah’s most scenic area, live in large urban cities such as Los Angeles and New York City. They may have never climbed to the top of a mountain range and looked down on a vista hundreds of miles across. They may have never lived intimately in nature, or have had to care for animals.

Teens ages 13-17 who attend Turn-About Ranch have any one of a number of diagnoses, including substance abuse, adjustment and anxiety disorders, bipolar disorder, depression, Opposition Defiant Disorder, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, and issues around attachment or eating. They may be acting out with such negative behaviors as promiscuity, running away, rebellion, poor academic performance, isolation and conflicts with authority.

Calming Effect of Ranch Life

Turn-About Ranch offers an entirely different environment and atmosphere for these troubled teens. At the ranch, they can remain in school and earn academic credits as they undergo daily psychotherapy with a team of trained professionals.

The main emphasis at the historic ranch, however, is on outdoor living. Teens take an active role in the daily running of a working ranch, feeding the chickens at dawn and bringing in the cows before dusk.

When the teens first arrive, they are assigned their own horses. They study horse anatomy and safety, and learn to take care of their animals. As they become bonded to their horses, they realize that their moods and thoughts affect their animals. This is a natural way of learning how moods and negativity can affect the people in their lives too.

Teens learn how to ride their horses in an arena, and eventually move on to trail riding. By the time they leave Turn-About Ranch, the teens have spent many days on horseback, “playing cowboy” and herding cattle.

Spending days riding horses and working with cattle has a calming effect on troubled teens. Riding provides vigorous exercise, making it possible for them to sleep harder and improve their physical health. According to the many psychologists who use hippotherapy, the natural repetitious rhythm of horseback riding has a positive effect not only on the mind, but also in regulating breathing and the limbic system of the human body.

A Change of Environment

Turn-About Ranch is unique because it is an actual working ranch that takes students out of their environment of television, music and video games and gets them excited about the natural environment. The magnificence of the natural scenery near Escalante, Utah, becomes part of the healing process as teens hike and ride on trails near the beautiful Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument and Bryce Canyon National Park.

Former residents describe their time at Turn-About Ranch as a “life-changing experience,” “the place that healed me” and “where I found out who I am.” As a program that uses only time-tested methods, Turn-About Ranch endures as a successful, and unique, therapeutic treatment program for troubled teens.